It was interesting to me to read a report on not just one aspect of oils that was tested, but a battery of identical tests done to 10 separate brands of oils.

I am not a scientist but the results appear to be be impressive with synthetics out performing conventionals by an average of 47%. I really want to know which sample is which brand but I am sure we will never know.

I did not see this report submitted here when I went looking for comments on it, so I thought I would contribute with hopes of hearing some thoughts from others.

This is a very nice paper. Well presented and the tests are meaningful to many folks. But, like most of the professional papers I have read, it does not address cylinder wear in the ring belt area, or bearing/journal wear.

And I could find no discussion of residual oil film thickness in say 48 hours of non-operation (drain-off). So, although useful as far as deposits and high temp stability, it does not answer the questions I want more information on ...

Do synthetics lubricate better than conventional oils? Still unknown ...

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Formerly in marine engineering. In an earlier life I owned my own petroleum tank truck, and hauled for the majors and independent's.

The real value in this article can be fond in the graphic results comparing the oils in each test. At least one of the conventional oils performed quite well in contrast to the synthetics on most tests, and at least one of the synthetics showed a rather mediocre performance. It sure would have been nice to know the identities of the oils.

Yes, I'd love to know what conventionals were nearly as good as the synthetics. And which 1-2 of those synthetics tested basically lousy.